


The Start of a Beautiful Friendship... Or Something Like That

by 1000PaperCranes



Category: Longmire (TV), Walt Longmire Mysteries - Craig Johnson
Genre: Gen, Major Character Injury, Post S4E10, The New Hector Problem, written before season 5
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-10
Updated: 2016-12-10
Packaged: 2018-09-07 14:19:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8804179
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1000PaperCranes/pseuds/1000PaperCranes
Summary: Mathias was right.  And that just sucks.  Just what does one do with a Standing Bear in the road?





	1. A Bear in the Road is Worth Two in the Truck... Or Something Like That

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fair warning: I did not shy away from Henry's injury, or the treatment thereof.

Henry Standing Bear teetered in the middle of the road, watching a red-tailed hawk circle in the sky.  Mathias eased the old truck to a stop very near the man, seeing him turn and his face become momentarily horrified.  He recovered quickly.  Sort of. 

"Hey." Mathias leaned out the window.  "Look what I found."

"Thanks," Henry's mouth regrouped quickly, but the rest of his face still knew it was screwed.  "I have been looking all over for it."   

"I bet."  Mathias climbed from the vehicle and they faced each other through the door. 

Henry looked away and back again, grasping for time, for ideas. "How can I repay you?"

"With blood," Mathias replied gravely, stripping a blanket from the seat, revealing stains they both knew were there, " _Hector_."

Henry didn't reply, looking between the blood and the tribal police officer.  Mathias opted to listen to Henry's expression.  'What happens now?'  Now, he waited to see if the guilty party would incriminate himself.  Henry's eyes just flickered between Mathias' face and the open door.  After nearly a full minute, Henry licked his lips, shut his eyes with a deep breath, and nodded.

"I told you, I was going to shut the new Hector down.  And now that you've gotten yourself shot, I'm doing it."  There was a long silence, during which Mathias hoped Henry would respond, but knew he would not.  With a sigh, Mathias pulled out his back-up cuffs.  They were more difficult to use but would be more comfortable for Henry to wear; it was a long drive back to Durant.  "Get in."

After a moment of hesitation, Henry limped around to the passenger side.  It was a slow, painful clamber into the vehicle.  Mathias took pity on him, pushing the handcuffs on gently and leaving them looser than was considered safe.  The victory he had been feeling was quickly seeping.  Messing with Standing Bear wasn't fair, or fun, under the circumstances. 

The truck lodged a similar complaint, refusing to start in its master's honor.  At least this time it only took twelve minutes instead of two hours for Mathias to get it going again.  Before they left, another car approached.  Recognizing Silas White Hare, Mathias stopped to share information with the Crow Chief of Police.

"Ho, Taia," the man greeted with a grin, leaning out his window as Mathias did the same.  Mathias bit his cheek, it wasn't as if White Hare shouldn't know and Standing Bear would just have to keep this secret with the rest.  "You here to help the Marshal?"

What was she here for?  "No, Sir, I'm on my way out."  Mathias hoped the older man wouldn't ask what he was doing here in the first place.

Silas hummed, clearly disappointed.  On another day, Mathias would have been eager to stay.  "Be careful, pup.  Marilyn wouldn't have called the Marshal if there weren't some powerful psychopathy running around."  Until that moment, Mathias hadn't believed Marilyn would call for white man's law for any reason.  No surprise she picked Marshal Becker, though.

"She didn't think you could handle it?"

White Hare laughed, unthreatened in his years of steady service.  "If it's like that, you're doing it wrong."  Trying not to pull a face, and likely failing, Mathias nodded.   Silas laughed harder.  When he spoke around his grin, it was in a fatherly way Mathias wished he didn't like.  "You'll get it, Taia.  Just focus on the job and let the rest of it happen."

Mathias watched the older officer drive away.  "Tie-uh?" Standing Bear sounded out.  Mathias cringed.  He restarted the engine, this time without trouble, and eased the old GMC down the road.

"He learned it from our boss at the BIA."  At least that's what Mathias assumed had happened.  Until today only two people had ever used the name, if anyone else knew it, he was in trouble.  The quality of Henry's silence induced Mathias to continue.  "Secretary kept pronouncing it Muh-tai-ass."  He leaned forward, checking the intersection around the tall grass, before turning onto the Absaroka road.

"Why not Matti?"

"I hate being called Matti." 

Standing Bear heard better than to reply.

Mathias thought deeply as he drove.  He would say Standing Bear did as well but had the distinct impression, each time he glanced over, that Henry's mind had hit that point where it just refused to work.  A tangle of worry – of disappointment and concern – bloomed in Mathias' belly over the hours.  On a particularly long, straight piece of road, he took a moment to really examine the barkeep.  The older man watched the scrubland fly by, mind derailed and spirit crushed, and Mathias _knew_.  Knew that he had been right, and that it sucked even more than he had feared.

Two hours until sundown, Mathias turned onto the Bastille Road.  Despite the space between them, he could feel Standing Bear tense.  As the miles ticked down, Henry's breathing became long and overly regular, almost a Ujjayi.  Tri-County Prison came up on their right and his breathing stopped all together.  Mathias kept the accelerator to the floor, sending them hurtling past the hulking gray nightmare just under the speed limit. Standing Bear stared at the building until it disappeared behind the trees.  Mathias grinned smarmily to himself as the man's breath returned.  Happenstance was better than taunting anyway - most days.

Another half hour past the prison, Mathias carefully took a nearly overgrown track.  They stopped under a tree.  Without a word, Mathias limped Henry Standing Bear several hundred yards to a small meadow.  Henry stood rigidly on the tree line as Mathias headed back to the truck.  Upon his return, the officer watched his detainee stiffen as he tromped up behind the man.  Mathias made no effort to quiet the rifle in his hand.

"Why not shoot me where there was a powerful psychopathy to blame it on?"

"I'm not going to shoot you."  Mathias passed him, picking out a place in the clearing where the sun would stay long enough.  He laid the gun down and pulled out a tattered sheet from the medical bag on his shoulder.  He used the heavy bag to crush the tall grasses, and then to hold down one end of the cloth.  He nudged the rifle onto the other end.  "Come here."  Haltingly, Standing Bear did as he was bade.  When he finally stood by the makeshift work station, Mathias knelt down, untying Henry's boots.  "Take off your pants."

Standing Bear didn't move.  "If you are not going to shoot me, what are you doing?"

Mathias smirked as he rifled through the jump bag, not answering the question.  "The new Doc at the clinic put this together for me.  I have no idea what's in it.  All I asked for was bandages and duct tape."  Out of the corner of his eye, Mathias watched to see if Standing Bear would put the pieces together.  The man just looked glazed.  Mathias hummed happily, pleasantly surprised at the… eclectic range of supplies he'd been provided.  He pulled out a mortar and pestle.  Crawling a few feet to a clump of the right herbs, he continued his narration.  "She almost didn't give it to me."  Mathias settled on his ass and, holding the mortar in the crook of his knee, began harvesting what he needed.  "She's there holding it out of my reach and asks me: good guy or bad guy?"

He stopped talking there, concentrating on portioning and grinding the medicine.  It was only partially intentional, but any guilt Mathias had felt for subtly needling Henry Standing Bear had disappeared when the man assumed him executioner.

"What did you say?"

"Take off your pants."

This time Standing Bear complied.  He made no effort to hide his pain, moving slowly to avoid aggravating his poorly treated wound.  Mathias forced himself to take in all the exposed skin, and not simply assume that the infected pustule on the man's thigh was the only injury.  That was going to be a bitch for a long time.  Flicking his eyes over the other various cuts and scrapes, Mathias decided that the bullet wound was the only one that needed more than a quick disinfecting.

"Lie down."

 _That_ Standing Bear did without hesitation.  The sheet wasn't large, but it was enough for Standing Bear, who settled on his stomach and elbows to watch his captor work.  "So… am I a good guy or a bad guy?"

Mathias smirked, tasting his poultice.  It was cold.  And needed more lavender.  Mathias scooted over to rummage in the frankly enormous first aid kit.  "Fallen Angel."  Of all the fucking things, there was the world's smallest camp stove tucked in the end pocket.  There was another gizmo packed in with the world's smallest fuel canister.  After several baffled minutes of examination, Mathias concluded it was a carefully homemade cauterization attachment.  What the hell did she think he was going to be doing: cleptoing kidneys?

He set up the stove, scraping the medicinal mash into a folding steel dish.  After a moment's consideration, Mathias snatched Standing Bear's pants to use as a fire break.  The last thing they needed was a running grass fire.  Even if Mathias intended to burn every bit of evidence he could - the Hector's Ghost get up in particular.  He shook his head.  Hector would be disappointed.  This whole situation was a mess.

Standing Bear was also a mess.  What did he use to close the wound, deer tendons?

After pulling on a pair of purple gloves, Mathias cut the old stitches with a needle-sharp pair of scissors he pulled from the suture kit.  Then he carefully lanced the infected pustule.  Teeth gritted against the pain, Henry hissed viscously as Mathias encouraged the wound to drain.  It wasn't enough.  He'd have to open the wound further to debride it and close the skin cleanly.

In the jump bag was a packet labeled WOUND CLEANSING ETC rubber-banded to a leaflet.  Mathias opened the paper.  It was a vascular diagram titled Where Not to Cut.  A sticky note covered the diagrams genitals.  In windy scrawl it read: _If you cut a blood vessel pack it with the HemoStop and CALL ME._   Mathias frowned.  How exactly was he supposed to know if he cut a blood vessel?  Wasn't _all_ bleeding from broken blood vessels?  He peeled the paper square away.  On the back was more writing.  A phone number and _Don't worry, you'll know._   He snorted derisively. 

At Standing Bear's raised brow, Mathias handed over the missive.  He spread out the diagram over the jump bag.  "Might as well scream," he warned Henry as he unpackaged a scalpel.  The injured man raised a sardonic brow, but quickly dropped his head to the blanket when Mathias reached out to brace his leg. 

Without preamble, Mathias drew the scalpel through wound, splitting the skin vertically.  Blood welled quickly, but Mathias ignored it, reaching for the rubbing alcohol and an abrasive pad included in the wound cleansing packet.  He poured the alcohol on, washing away the blood to reveal the damaged tissue beneath.  Mathias grit his teeth, he hadn't ever been shy of fighting, but simply causing pain never sat well with him; and this was going to hurt.  A lot.

After a short, stubborn moment, Henry's screams rent the air as Mathias set to briskly scrubbing away the decay and debris hiding within Standing Bear's inexpertly tended wound.  The older man had settled into a wordless groan as Mathias scrubbed, but when he irrigated the newly enlarged bullet hole, Henry screamed anew.  Unfortunately, beneath the blood was more damage.  Peeling out a new abrasive pad, Mathias returned to scrubbing.

The next rinse showed clean flesh and Mathias blew out a grim, gusty breath of progress.  He changed gloves and picked up a wicked looking pre-threaded needle with the included Mathieu clamp.  Why did medical people have to name _everything_?  Mathias grit his teeth, even that short break was sure to have Standing Bear screaming again.  It wasn't the vague chance that they would get caught that bothered him; it was more the fact that the longer this took the closer it edged toward torture.

Standing Bear tensed when Mathias aligned his skin.  The first bite of the needle started off a moan that made Mathias slightly nauseous. He forced himself not to rush, steadily laying neat stitches until the bullet hole was a thing of the past.  Another quick dousing of alcohol and it was finally time to apply the poultice and bandage the whole thing.

The yelp the older man gave when Mathias pressed the steaming poultice to Standing Bear's skin would have been hilarious on a different day.  It took two rolls of gauze, far more than Mathias would have used on himself, but yet another note tucked into the jump bag assuaged his guilt.  _Supplies are cheap.  Use as much as you need.  I hate doing amputations._   Amputation.  Despite the despicable condition of Henry Standing Bear's leg before he started, Mathias couldn't imagine that single hole killing the entire limb.

Mathias changed gloves again and began studiously wiping down Henry's legs, cleansing the multitude of small lacerations and removing rivulets of blood.  After all that, it seemed strange for the work to be over, but over it was.  Mathias snapped his gloves off and began disassembling the tiny camp stove.  He scraped left over poultice onto the sheet beside Standing Bear, who lay partially insensate.  It would be several more minutes before the man had recovered enough to move under his own power, and by that time, Mathias intended to be completely ready to leave.

"Now what?"  Standing Bear's voice was ruined when it broke the productive silence.

"Now," Mathias pulled the zipper on the med kit harder than was necessary, "You put your clothes on."

Henry climbed slowly to his feet, staggering for his pants.  Mathias didn't spare the time to watch him, quickly rolling up his work space.  He slung the jump bag over his shoulder, scooping up the sheet and the rifle, and making quickly for the truck.

Upon his return, Mathias found Standing Bear unsteadily picking his way towards the edge of the clearing.  After a final check to make sure they had left nothing behind – Mathias crammed an unused glove in his pocket – the tribal policeman slug his detainee's arm over his shoulders.  They staggered back to the GMC, Mathias trying all the while to avoid thinking about what he would say, what he would _do_ , if they were discovered.

To his undying relief, they were not.  He loaded Henry into the truck, then took his own place behind the wheel.  Despite the burning need to be anywhere less incriminating, Mathias found the forefront of his mind going blank.  He sat there for quite some time, just breathing, and not thinking about what he had done, and staring at his hands through the steering wheel.  Next to him, Henry did something remarkably similar.

When they arrived at the clinic, the new doc wasn't waiting for them.  Not that Mathias had been expecting her, but the whole day had had this bizarre Hollywood quality that left him vaguely expecting a team of surgeons to come bursting out of the building with a gurney.  As it was, Cody Rawlings' bicycle was out front and it was probably best to wait for the boy to leave.

Neither man was particularly talkative at the best of times, but something about the silence of the ensuing wait pressed uncomfortably on Mathias.

 "Hector learned to be Hector one step at a time," he told Standing Bear after several minutes.  "You can't simply step into his footprints and fill his shoes."  Sluggishly, the other man turned away from the building to stare at Mathias.  "You need to be Henry, not Hector."  Henry didn't say anything.  That was alright, Mathias had one more point to make.  "But if Henry is a guy that solves problems by shooting people, he can damn well stay home."

It seemed that Standing Bear was not out of stupid delusions.  "Give me one good reason."

Mathias surprised them both.  He leaned over, kissing Henry soundly on the mouth.  "I'll tell everyone," he whispered, "even Walt."

"You'll take us both down," Standing Bear tried to argue, but Mathias was already slamming the door shut behind him.  He collected the equipment and evidence from the bed of the truck and marched into the clinic without looking back.


	2. All's Well That Ends Well... Or Something Like That

Eventually, things go to hell in a hand-basket.  Henry has verbal sparring matches with Malachi, that he loses.  He stands there after they are over, ignoring Jacob Nighthorse's veiled words in the back of his head for the memory of Mathias' lips.  The kiss was a little thing, comparatively, but it still burns brightly in Henry's memory.  It also keeps Hector's Ghost from hunting down Walker Browning like a deer on the plains; even after the psycho puts half an ounce of lead in Doctor Donna Sue Monahan and makes repeated attempts to kill Walt, perforating him on four different occasions.

In the end, it's Mathias who puts a bullet through Walker Browning's ear.  Henry looks up, his mind clearing from the chaos – the fear for his life, the _regret_ that he hadn't ended Browning when he had the chance, the desperate scrabbling to _survive this_ – to see the Chief of the Cheyenne Tribal Police snap the bolt back on his rifle.  Walt twists around, arms swinging aggressively, looking for more hostile oil rig workers.  In the sudden silence, Henry very nearly cries.

Suddenly, Henry is halfway up the short but relatively steep hill where Mathias stands easy next to a larch tree.  For one wild second, Henry envisions himself kissing the smaller man like something out of a B Western.  By the time he stands before Mathias, Henry isn't even sure if he should thank the man.

"Is that a Browning?"  Henry reaches out for the rifle.  Mathias' ironic smirk is answer enough, but he allows the firearm to be lifted out of his hands.  It is an old manufacture, probably original to Mathias' grandfather.  The stock is a glossy, deep chestnut, and the whole thing is impeccably maintained.  Why the fuck is Henry examining Mathias' gun?  He really _should_ be thanking the man.  "Have you eaten?"

Mathias laughs. 

Walt hollers for Henry's cell phone.

**Author's Note:**

> Please no spoilers until I give the all clear. Once I'm caught up we can have a good laugh about how far off I was.
> 
> Edit: All right, I'm caught up. Let 'er rip.


End file.
